2001 census of India

The 2001 census of India was the 14th in a series of censuses held in India every decade since 1871.^[1]

14th census of India
← 1991 2001 (2001) 2011 →
General information
Country	India
Results
Total population	1,028,737,436 (21.5%)
Most populous state	Uttar Pradesh (166,053,600)
Least populous state	Sikkim (541,902)

The population of India was counted as 1,028,737,436 consisting of 532,223,090 males and 496,514,346 females.^[2] The total population increased by 182,310,397, 21.5% more than the 846,427,039 people counted during the 1991 census.^[2]

Religious demographics

Hindus comprise 82.75 crore (80.45%) and Muslims were 13.8 crore (13.4%) in the 2001 census.^[3][4] Census 2001 showed 108 faiths under the head "Other Religions and Persuasion" (ORP) in India.^[5] 700,000 people did not state their religion.^[6]

Population trends for major religious groups in India (2001)

Religious group	Population %
Hindu	80.45%
Muslim	13.4%
Christian	2.34%
Sikh	1.89%
Buddhist	0.74%
Animist, others	0.43%
Jain	0.46%

Language demographics

Main article: Languages of India

Hindi is the most widely spoken language in northern parts of India. The Indian census takes the widest possible definition of "Hindi" as a broad variety of "Hindi languages". According to 2001 census, 53.6% of Indian population know Hindi, in which 41% of them have declared Hindi as their native language or mother tongue.^[7][8][9] English is known to 12.18% Indians in the 2001 census. The number of bilingual speakers in India is 25.50 crore, which is 24.8% of the population in 2001.^[10] India (780) has the world's second highest number of languages, after Papua New Guinea (839).^[11]

First, second, and third languages by number of speakers in India (2001 census)

Language	First language speakers		Second language speakers[12]	Third language speakers[12]	Total speakers
	number [13][12]	% of total pop.[14]			number [15][12]	% of total pop.[14]
Hindi	422,048,642	41.03%	98,207,180	31,160,696	551,416,518	53.60%
English	226,449	0.02%	86,125,221	38,993,066	125,344,736	12.18%
Bengali	83,369,769	8.10%	6,637,222	1,108,088	91,115,079	8.86%
Telugu	74,002,856	7.19%	9,723,626	1,266,019	84,992,501	8.26%
Marathi	71,936,894	6.99%	9,546,414	2,701,498	84,184,806	8.18%
Tamil	60,793,814	5.91%	4,992,253	956,335	66,742,402	6.49%
Urdu	51,536,111	5.01%	6,535,489	1,007,912	59,079,512	5.74%
Kannada	37,924,011	3.69%	11,455,287	1,396,428	50,775,726	4.94%
Gujarati	46,091,617	4.48%	3,476,355	703,989	50,271,961	4.89%
Odia	33,017,446	3.21%	3,272,151	319,525	36,609,122	3.56%
Malayalam	33,066,392	3.21%	499,188	195,885	33,761,465	3.28%
Sanskrit	14,135	<0.01%	1,234,931	3,742,223	4,991,289	0.49%

Graphical summaries

• 
  Overview of 2001 population, separated by gender and age bracket.
• 
  2001 overview based on religious affiliation and language.

See also

• 1991 census of India
• 2011 census of India
• Demographics of India